


Never Gonna Give You Up

by todisturbtheuniverse



Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age - All Media Types, Dragon Age II
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, F/F, F/M, Flirting, Fluff, Friendship
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-07-31
Updated: 2014-07-31
Packaged: 2018-02-11 04:14:06
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,075
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2053164
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/todisturbtheuniverse/pseuds/todisturbtheuniverse
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Rick rolling isn't always awful.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Never Gonna Give You Up

**Author's Note:**

  * For [hollyand](https://archiveofourown.org/users/hollyand/gifts).



> Prompted by hollyand-writes on Tumblr: Carver/Merrill, never gonna give you up.

It starts innocuously enough, with a link Hawke sends to Varric via text.

That’s Hawke. Totally scatterbrained. She doesn’t even bother to cover it with words or somehow try to trick him into clicking, and dammit, that’s her strength. Everyone expects the random video of birds mating set to the catchiest new pop song to come from Hawke—without explanation, without cushion.

Bemused, wondering what miracle of nature he’ll be subjected to this time, Varric clicks the link.

“ _We’re no strangers to love_ —”

He nearly drops his phone in his haste to go back,  _back_ , back away from the horrible song pouring from his speakers.

"Hawke," he mutters, uttering the name like a curse.

* * *

When rickrolling starts, it doesn’t stop until it’s rampaged through a group of people like the friendship-killing plague it is. Once it hits the individual who can’t keep their mouth shut, everyone in the group braces for it, hesitates over every link, reconsiders every e-mail. It’s hard to organize important group outings when you’re too afraid to check your text messages.

Carver’s the snitch this time, of course. He likes to try to make everyone hate Hawke every once in a while—just to keep her on her toes. He’s disappointed by the result, though; everyone grumbles and groans at the news, but no one really takes it up with  _Hawke_.

No. They take it up with  _him_.

"You just had to tell us," Isabela moans, slumping over her pint. "I’m going to be on edge for  _weeks_  now.” She shoots a glare at Varric. “And don’t you dare send it to him to get revenge. I want him to suffer with the rest of us.”

Varric snickers and doesn’t comment. Carver scowls at the lot of them. That is, of course, the moment that Hawke blows into the bar, brushing the dust from her leather jacket.

"Evening," she sings out, leaning down to drop a kiss on Isabela’s cheek. She drops to the seat beside her. "Why the long faces?"

"Carver," Aveline says, perfectly stoic, "just told us what you sent Varric."

Hawke frowns at him. “Car _ver_ ,” she groans. “That’s terribly bad manners. I thought I taught you better.”

"He was trying to warn us," Merrill says, in that kind way of hers. She’s rather squished between Carver and the wall, currently. He tries to edge over a bit to give her more room, but ends up bumping elbows a little too aggressively with Fenris. She smiles and shakes her head at him.

His heart, traitorous organ that it is, beats a little faster at that. He almost misses Isabela’s next comment.

"No, he wasn’t," she snorts. "He was trying to get big sister in trouble."

"Did it work?" Hawke asks, smiling.

"No," Carver mutters.

He spends the rest of the evening mostly hiding behind his beer. Hawke, Isabela, Aveline, and Bethany don’t drink more than a pint before leaving the bar; Hawke has plans to finish off the Undercuts tonight. Carver wasn’t invited, of course. Bethany gives him a sympathetic smile before sliding off her stool and following their sister to the street.

"You know," Merrill says thoughtfully, "I don’t think I’ve ever been…what did Varric call it?"

For a moment, Carver doesn’t know what she’s talking about, but then he remembers how the conversation began. “Rick rolled,” he supplies.

"Yes, that," Merrill says, straightening up. "I don’t think I’ve ever been rick rolled before."

He looks at her puzzled frown and can’t help but give her an answering smile. “It’s nothing special,” he assures her. “Kind of annoying, really.”

Her green eyes go a little thoughtful. She sips meditatively at her beer. Just when he thinks she’s given up this line of questioning, she says, “ _I_ don’t mind that you told us. I’m excited. It’s something to look forward to.”

He smiles at her again. It kind of hurts, that earnestness of hers, but it’s nice to know that she never says anything just to make him feel better. It’s all honest, unfiltered Merrill.

He likes that about her.

* * *

It’s slow going, waiting for the video to move through each of their friends. Carver isn’t even sure how many of them are still ahead of him in the line; they’ve carefully hidden all their reactions from him. Eventually, he forgets all about it.

Weeks from the Inciting Incident, the gang huddles over drinks at their usual haunt. His sisters are out hunting criminals without him again. His phone pings, which strikes him as odd; everyone he knows is either here or too busy to talk to the likes of him.

He tugs it from his pocket. It’s a text message from Merrill, who was sitting two inches from him not five minutes ago.

 _You would not believe the spider in the ladies’ room_ , it says.  _It’s spinning this marvelous web._

He clicks the youtube link, chuckling at the idea of her holed up in the restroom taking a video of a spider while other women come in and out. He’s sort of touched that she bothered to send it to him, actually. It’s very sweet, in Merrill’s odd way.

And then he hears it.

“ _We’re no strangers to love_ —”

Everyone else at their table hears it, too. The laughter starts up—Varric pounding the table, Fenris cracking a rare smile, Sebastian chuckling under his breath—but, oddly enough, Carver can’t find it in him to feel humiliated.

She got him. She got him  _good_. He’s sort of proud of her, actually. He weathers the entire video just because of that.

She comes back to the table a few minutes later, pink in the cheeks, and slides bashfully into the chair beside his.

"Was it awful?" she asks, the corner of her mouth twitching dangerously.

"Tell you what," Carver tells her, leaning closer. For conspiratorial reasons, he tells himself. "You help me get my sister back, we’re even."

She grins up at him, shyness forgotten, and he’s a little transfixed by how it transforms her face. “Deal,” she says, sticking her hand out to shake. He barely remembers himself in time to reciprocate naturally.

"I didn’t know you had it in you," he comments, pulling the pitcher over to top off her pint.

"I have a  _lot_  of things in me,” she says loftily, and that’s the moment when he laughs so hard that he spills beer all over both of them, and she doesn’t even mind.


End file.
